TromboneChat

The world is chalk full of Charlatans, There's a guy on Reverb selling that well-known horn, the King 2B Tempo, for $1,150.

When I asked him to send a photo of the engraving on the bell (noticeably absent from the various other photos), I got this great response:

"The Tempo model was the predecessor to the 2B. Has exactly the same specs as a 2B. It's not engraved as a 2B, but they're sold as such. Hope this helps."

Wow, such a breadth of knowledge!

My m.o. when buying a horn from someone you don't know: ask them about it, if they're full of shit, this will become readily apparent.

Good advice. And asking for detailed pics of specific parts of the horn can help weed out the scammers. (Once, for a suspicious ad, I asked for a Pic of the inside of the main tuning slide, because I wanted to check for green corrosion. Never heard back.)
And this "2B Tempo" ad reminds me of the early days of ebay, when most items did not include pictures, and I was
duped. I bought what was advertised as a Bach 36B Stradivarious, with a detailed description. When the horn arrived, it was stamped "Bach USA" on the bell, and was clearly a Bach Intermediate model. The condition was as described. After many messages back and forth where the seller insisted that it was a 36 Strad and I contradicted him, wanting to return it with a refund, I filed a complaint with ebay. They sided with the seller.
I sold the horn with an honest description, at a loss of course.

There's been more than one time that I've had an impulse to purchase something that's inaccurately described just so I can go after the seller, but there's always the chance that they're just repeating in good faith what was told to them when they purchased it.

One of the reasons I started my website was to provide people with reference materials so they'd be less likely to be misled.

Asking for additional photographs can be a good way to make sure the seller actually has the instrument in hand. I've had quite of few people contact me wanting to sell me a "one-of-a-kind" Olds something-or-other and then ghost me when I ask a close-up of some part of the horn.